Kill the baby seals!

[Double Barrel]

Canada embarks on mass seal hunt

THE CULL
Up to 350,000 baby harp seals to be killed this season
Preliminary culls started at the beginning of April
2,500 men and 150 trawlers to gather for intensive 36-hour phase of cull on 12 April
Up to 10,000 seals to be killed per daylight hour
Killing of "whitecoat" seals - aged up to 12 days - banned

Canadian sealers have pushed out to sea for the largest cull in 50 years despite protests by environmentalists and animal rights groups.

The government is allowing more than 300,000 seals to be killed, arguing that the campaign is both ecologically sound and economically justified.

Protests helped end the hunting of young seals for their pelts off Canada's east coast 25 years ago.

Some activists say their efforts to report this cull are being blocked.

Sealers have been making their way out to ice floes off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador for the annual hunt.

Under new guidelines, most seals are meant to be shot and not clubbed to death in a bid to make the killing more humane.

Around 140,000 seals are expected to be slaughtered by the end of Tuesday.

Fish stocks

The seal hunt in Newfoundland and Labrador withered 25 years ago as images of hunters clubbing infant seals horrified TV viewers across the world.

The US banned imports of seal products in 1972 and the EU followed suit a decade later with a ban on white pelt imports, taken from the youngest babies.

As a result, the Canadian government reduced quotas for seal hunting to as low as 15,000 annually - mainly for meat and local handicraft.

But with fur again in fashion the hunt is back.

Canada increased the quotas last year, allowing a million seals to be killed over the space of three years.

Canadian Natural Resources Minister John Efford said many claims about the hunt were simply wrong.

He argued that the seal population was exploding - an estimated 5.2 million harp seals in the North Atlantic at present - and commercial fish stocks were vanishing.

Mr Efford added that the cull was important for the local economy during a traditionally slow economic time of the year.

Permits 'delayed'

But the BBC's Ian Gunn in Vancouver, Canada, says it would be difficult to counter the image of dying seals with such arguments.

The Canadian tourism commission admitted last week it was keeping an eye open for an international backlash should the protests gather strength.

One campaigning group, the US-based Humane Society, has been taking full-page adverts in prominent American newspapers to urge a travel boycott against Canada.

Groups accuse officials of "attempting to scapegoat seals" for their own fisheries mismanagement.

The International Fund for Animal Welfare (Ifaw) says government guidelines on humane hunting methods are being ignored.

"We filmed and witnessed seals being skinned alive right in front of us," Ifaw activist Rebecca Aldworth told Reuters news agency last week.

"We saw live seals being dragged while conscious across the ice with boat hooks, we saw stockpiles of dead and dying seals, it was really horrific."

The Ifaw also accused Canada's federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans of deliberately delaying the issue of ice floe permits to protesters wishing to witness the hunt.

Source

Sounds like a nice event to plan your vacation around. Fun for the whole family! :rocket:

 

[The Last Conformist]

Won't shooting the seals instead of clubbing them damage the skins more?

 

[Amenhotep7]

The secret evil of Canada is unleashed.

Just joking.

 

[Desmond Hawkins]

Shooting seals, that is terrible! They are damaging the precious furs. When you club it, you can mash up its brain without damaging what actually counts.

I mean.....us Canadians aren't evil

 

[Desmond Hawkins]

The damned Hollywood liberal media is giving us so much trouble over it lately.

Quite honestly, I didn't support the baby seal slaughter that much, until I saw that Paris Hilton was campaigning against it.

 

[Double Barrel]

heh-heh-heh, thats pretty funny, Sobieski II! You should send an e-mail telling her that because of her support, you have decided that you are going to become a baby seal hunter.

I was just a little surprised that this story hasn't gotten that much coverage. I remember the previous outrage, where the Greenpeace videos showed hunters clubbing seals, and the activists were spray painting the seals to make their fur worthless.

 

[Zeekater]

It is quite an outrage too!

1. it isn't necessairy for the fishermen, they make enough money as it is (but some easy bux for a week work)

2. they don't know how to hit them correctly (so they die instantly) so some seals are lying there dying, some are alive when then skin them.

3. they can no longer hunt those younger then 12 days, but now they hunt them on 13 days

it's a disgrace the canadian goverment is allowing this!

 

[Desmond Hawkins]

Honestly, you are probably right Zeekator, although if it was for food purposes I would think otherwise, but it is not. But at the same time, at least they are not attacking endangered species.

I find the whole "only kill ugly animals" attitude annoying, but the hunt does seem unnecessary.

 

[WillJ]

So THAT'S what was meant when Canada announced it's going to reconquer the Arctic (see this thread).

 

[Desmond Hawkins]

We needed a military opponent of relatively equal strength

 

[WillJ]

Originally posted by Sobieski II
We needed a military opponent of relatively equal strength

Not to mention equal intelligence, eh?

 

[MrPresident]

Originally posted by Zeekater
it isn't necessairy for the fishermen, they make enough money as it is

Just how much money is enough?

Originally posted by Zeekater
they don't know how to hit them correctly

Practice makes perfect.

I say hunt away. The more they kill the less appear on rubbish calenders.

 

[Oruc]

they have to get the fur from somwhere

 

[Desmond Hawkins]

The one thing that bothers me though, is that if the Inuit are going to complain that they need to hunt them to fit their traditional lifestyle before Canadians "contaminated" them, they should also have to get rid of all their guns and Bombardier snowmobiles and other western "contaminations" and hunt the seals, whales, and all other prey with spear (and club). We supply them with modern technology to live, yet are still accused of ruining their lifestyle.

 

[Suki]

but is this really much worse than the beef or chicken industry?
it is grotesque, and these alimals weren't raised to be slaughtered like farm animals, it could have a significant impact on local ecosystems, and it's obvious that seals couldn't be nearly as important in fish management as fishermen; seals and fish were at an equelibrium, and since we apeared the fish have been declining steadily....

But somehow i don't think there would be nearly as much compassion for these things if they weren't so cute, with their big eyes; trying to look like human babbies

what if they were really ugly?
like the Babirusa

or the angler fish

equal rights for ugly animals!

 

[Desmond Hawkins]

Or just equally bad rights for all animals.

 

[Amenhotep7]

Aww...

The Angler Fish and BArbirusa are sooooo cute.

j/k

 

[CurtSibling]

You lot make me laugh with your macho-posturing when talking about killing creatures.

I wonder how many people here would keep their lunch down if they were even near a pile of dead or skinned animals?

What a bunch!

 

[MrPresident]

Originally posted by CurtSibling
I wonder how many people here would keep their lunch down if they were even near a pile of dead or skinned animals?

I have. And what do you think the lunch was made of?

 

[cgannon64]

Baby Seals: They've had it too good for too long.